ABSTRACT
This chapter considers three groups of contemporary rational choice theories that have come to prominence with that revival: contemporary deterrence theories, rational choice theories and routine activities theory. Contemporary rational actor theories also focus on individuals and their choices, while ignoring the social constraints and conditions that shape the circumstances in which they live, their thought processes and life chances. A more sophisticated and highly influential variant of rational choice theory has been subsequently developed notably through the work of Clarke and Cornish. Routine activities theory is, to some extent, a development and subdivision of rational choice theory, which proposes that, for a personal or property crime to occur, there must be at the same time and place a perpetrator, a victim and/or an object of property. The Classical theorists had emphasized the rationally calculating, reasoning human being who could be deterred from choosing to commit criminal behaviour by the threat of fair and proportionate punishment.
